Protest compels city corporation officials to halt eviction

The encroachments on the government land after providing alternative accommodation to them

COIMBATORE: Following the directions of the Madras high court, the city corporation launched an eviction drive at Jeeva Nagar in Kavundampalayam in the city on Friday. But after demolishing a shop in the locality, the civic body had to halt the drive as residents launched a protest. Members of the KK Pudur Welfare Association had filed a writ petition in the court in 2000, stating that 1km stretch of the 70-Fee Link Road, a part of the designated cart road, was encroached and as a result, emergency service vehicles including ambulance and fire service vehicles could enter the street. HC directed the civic body to evict the encroachments on the government land after providing alternative accommodation to them. “As per the directions, we were ready to allot alternative accommodation to all the 252 families residing at Jeeva Nagar. But only 100 were ready to shift and were given the tokens for the apartments in the housing unit of the Tamil Nadu Slum Clearance Board (TNSCB) at Keerantham,” a corporation official said. Thought the corporation had identified the number of encroachers and issued tokens about five months ago, the eviction notices were issued only on February 14. The residents were given time till February 18. “We decided to speed up the eviction process after receiving two contempt notices from the court. We are ready to provide alternative accommodation to all the families and will evict them at the earliest,” the official told TOI. But, many residents were not ready to shift. “We have been residing in the locality for over 40 years. When we moved in, the area used to be waterlogged during rainy seasons. There were poisonous snakes everywhere. Several people died due to snake bite. Instead of all that, we sorted out the problems one after the other and laid the road with our hard-earned money,” said Kaliammal, a 70-year-old resident. “When we have been paying all kind of taxes, including the property tax and water tax just like any other resident, why should we leave the houses we built? We are ready to provide space for road expansion but will not vacate our houses.”

TNSCB had signed a lease agreement with the residents in the 90s, said Mohammed Irsadh, another resident. “As per the agreement, residents would be provided patta if they paid Rs 2,000 to Rs 8,000 based on the size of the houses. Most of us had paid the amount.” Acknowledging that such an agreement was signed, a TNSCB official said that it was to compensate the amount that they had paid, they were provided alternative accommodation free of cost. “The residents have no other option, but to obey the court order,” he said.